There is a portion of your customers’ buying process that you are probably ignoring today. It occurs long before any discussion of products, services, or RFPs—indeed, it occurs before customers have even begun to think about a purchase. It’s the point at which customers come to the realization of an important business need—what we call the epiphany stage.

Key Takeaways

• Engaging with customers and prospects during the Epiphany Stage gives providers an advantage in helping shape the scope and requirements of the project.
• Marketing needs to seed the epiphanies with deep customer and industry research and thought leadership.
• Success in the epiphany stage requires aligning the sales and marketing processes with the customer’s buying process.
• Sales must change its emphasis from transactional to consultative selling.
• Compensation management processes must become more flexible, to reward progress toward a sale as well as hard revenue dollars.